


Leaving

by suumilk



Series: Poison [1]
Category: Tennis no Oujisama | Prince of Tennis
Genre: Angst, Gen, M/M, Multi, Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-16
Updated: 2020-07-19
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:15:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,392
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22753846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/suumilk/pseuds/suumilk
Summary: The disappearance of Marui Bunta through the eyes of the other members. Set in 2018 of the 'Birth And Fester' universe.
Relationships: Jackal Kuwahara/Marui Bunta, Niou Masaharu/Yagyuu Hiroshi, Sanada Genichirou/Yukimura Seiichi
Series: Poison [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1642408
Comments: 1
Kudos: 12
Collections: Birth And Fester





	1. Kirihara Akaya

Nobody expected them to grow old together, to stay friends with each other when the club activities end, when the matches stopped becoming a thing anymore, when tennis no longer was a part of their lives.

Marui was the first one to go.

He was never good at keeping in touch with other people, nor was he the sentimental kind. So when it was time for him to go, he didn’t linger. He picked up his bags and walked out of the doors.

He didn’t offer any explanations nor any excuses. He didn’t offer anything to soothe the hurt. But that’s just the kind of guy he was:  _ self-centered _ , so nobody said a thing.

Kirihara threw a tantrum. He cussed and cussed until his throat could no longer scream anymore without feeling like it’s being cut up into pieces. Then he cried. Because Marui had been the one who pulled him into the tennis team, wasn’t he? When he was just a brat full of hubris and way too much pride. It had been him and Jackal who held his hands and took his hand and pulled him to be part of something, to be part of  _ this _ .

_ This _ , which Marui had left unceremoniously. 

For all that he was, Kirihara had always clung softly to the idea that they would be together, in one way or another. They had shared a bond from middle school all through high school. Even in college they somehow managed to keep in touch with one another –– and he had been purposely turning a blind eye to the scattered absences and half-hearted replies that came from Marui in their meet-ups and group chats, not wanting to see it for what it really was.

It’s been one month since anyone has ever heard or seen from the former volley specialist. It was just as if he’d been swallowed into the center of the earth; never to come back, nor to be found.

“Well at least...you still keep in touch with him, right, Senpai?” 

Kirihara’s voice was slightly raspy from his outburst. Yukimura had always said he let his emotions control him too much, and it was true, even now. He was out of breath, his chest falling and rising rapidly as if he had just been from the fields, and his vision was shaky as he took a sweeping look across their table in the restaurant at the faces he had grown up with.

They all refused to look at him, or to each other. For if they do, they’d see how they all feel inside about Marui’s departure, and that would make it real.

He hated it. 

He hated it all.

And most of all, he hated his voice, still wrapped with a thin film of hope, like the transparent plastic of a candy wrapper Marui always shared with him, as he addressed Jackal. Pathetically wishing that the other would give an excuse for Marui’s radio silence; because they were still living together, still talk to each other on a daily basis, still making Jackal do his biddings with that carefree grin of his.

Yet his question was met with a strained smile, which turned somewhat bitter and nobody had ever seen Jackal smiled like that. Yanagi stopped typing on his laptop for a moment; it was rude to stare but he couldn’t help it. There was something in how he could hear the hollow crack of Jackal’s heart from his broken smile.

“He left..”

The voice that left him was a thin little thing, like it could be snapped into two, like everything that Jackal wasn’t. 

But that wasn’t the most painful thing that left everyone speechless nor was it the thing that gave a pregnant pause as everyone ceased from whatever they were doing; it wasn’t his voice, it was how Jackal still tried to smile and how he still tried to make it seem like everything’s alright.

The pull of his lips that felt almost too unnatural. The awkward hand that Jackal didn’t quite know what to do with; one moment he left it on his lap and then a violent tug to scratch at the back of his head as his smile stretched wider, almost to reassure himself that everything was alright.

A rough whisper of profanity slipped from Kirihara’s lips, one that was met with reprimandation from their former vice captain, and he slumped back down to his seat. He clamped his hand over his mouth to quell the sick feeling brewing inside him, threatening to spill over from his mouth as he wondered just  _ what the fuck _ happened between the two.

Marui was selfish, of course. But he wasn’t cruel.  _ His _ Marui-senpai wasn’t a cruel person.

But a person who’s not cruel would not make Jackal wear such an expression on his face. A kind person would be there with them, or at least say their goodbye before they go on with their life. 

After all, didn’t they spend more than a decade with each other? Did that not mean anything to Marui?

Kirihara was too stubborn to admit, even in his anger, that this would mean that Marui was not necessarily all that nice because that would mean betraying his memory and all the good days they’ve all spent together. 

It would be tainting the bright picture that Marui occupied in his memory, and he was not prepared for that first drop of ink to taint it.

So he sat, seething, angry,  **betrayed** .

No one spoke again after that. No one questioned anything. Yet everyone could hear the looming interlude that enveloped their group even if no one spoke of it, as if casting a dark veil upon the truth that had never been revealed before –– either from voluntary blindness or blissful ignorance.


	2. Sanada Genichirou

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The disappearance of Marui Bunta through the eyes of the other members.

“Unacceptable,” said Sanada, with a voice just above a whisper. It was barely for any ears to hear yet it was so saturated with emotion that it trembled so, and Yukimura, who sat beside him, casted his gaze towards his partner, and said nothing.

Yukimura knew what Sanada was like, the code of moral and conduct that he held so vehemently, as if the world would crumble down if he were to let go of this principles, as if this world was not already a dissonance, a disarray, a misharmony.

However Sanada always tried his best to make sense of things, to make harmony of a chaos, to make right of all the wrongs in this world. He saw the world through a black and white lense and there was only ever right and wrong. This time, unfortunately for Marui, he was in the wrong.

That Marui had neglected Jackal, that he had failed to even parted properly with the others, was highly ____ in Sanada’s eyes. Of course everyone had lives outside of their little circle; he did not deny that. Even Sanada had friends his former tennis club members did not know of, whether personally or just in passing.

He knew of this, and yet, he expected a semblance of decorum from Marui as he separated himself from his group, as he moved on towards whatever the world might had in store for him, whatever he set his eyes on. Sanada felt his heart hardening as blurry images of Marui flashed in his head; he was always in his own little world –– in a way, in a very  _ painful _ way, it reminded him of Yukimura, and it terrified him so. 

Perhaps he was projecting his own fears into the situation. 

What if this were Yukimura, what if that smile were to disappear from his life one day, just like this: suddenly, without a warning. All his world would surely turn to black again. His hand reached for Yukimura’s from under the table half instinctively, as if to reassure himself that he was still here. There was an unmistakable sigh of relief as their hands touched and his warmth seeped into Sanada’s, drenching him in his colours, the soft blues of a summer sky just before everything turns to white once more.

“This is unacceptable behaviour! I’ll call him,” there was a hushed sound of disagreement coming from his side and his back ran cold once more, despite their interlocking fingers, despite their deeply embedded souls in one another. Or at least that was what he’d like to believe. The very fact that the thought even crossed his mind and made a temporal stop in his line of thoughts deeply perturbed him and he tore his hand away from Yukimura’s to seize his phone.

“Sanada-kun, I don’t think it is our place to –” Yagyuu started to say, as he pushed his glasses up, but Sanada was quick to cut him.

“If not us, then who’s going to tell him?!”

There was a second in which Sanada was sure that Yagyuu had frowned, his expression dark as he stared at Sanada, but it was gone just as quickly as it appeared, as if it was nothing but a delusion that he started seeing at the heat of things, as anxiety started to pile up inside him, bubbling up like a witch’s brew. Unsettling. Green.

“No, really – it’s fine already, I...truthfully I didn’t even want to bring it up” said Jackal, still wearing that smile that Sanada wanted to rip off his face. How could he be so calm like this? All those messages he sent in the group chat, had Marui already been gone? Had he been enduring it alone?

If it had been him, he would do the same.

Truth be told, he knew deep down that Marui's behaviour wasn’t the only thing that riled him up – as crude as it was, as inappropriate as it was. There was no way he’s going to admit it, because that would mean denying everything that he had tried to uphold for all these years, the relationship that he’s worked on, the image of his beloved that he had built brick by brick. 

What would happen if he pulled even one yellow brickstone off the foundation? Everything would crumble. He would be crushed beneath it all, he would have to admit that this was all make-believe, a play-act; strong as he was on the court and in life itself, he was not so sure that he could take it.

He had molded Yukimura into his core, and he had depended on the image he imprinted towards the other like a lifeblood: coursing through his vein, running through all of his being, fueling him, keeping him alive.

That was why he was so adamant as his fingers moved through his phone screen, so angry he was in his movements that you could almost taste it in the air that lingered heavily around them. 

“I’ll give him a scolding. This is unacceptable behaviour, even coming from Marui,”

Yes, Sanada was eternally dismayed towards Marui Bunta’s very nature, his every manner of being, of existing in this world. The way he carried himself so insouciantly, as if the rest of the world didn’t matter to him. Of course, there were things that  _ did _ matter. He knew how much tears, blood, and sweat Marui poured into tennis the time they were together in those bygone days of youth.

But even things that are so deeply stained with the color passion for him, and for the others, for Marui was nothing but fleeting. 

Sanada could never understand Marui completely, no matter how he tried to make sense of him. Trying to understand Marui, he concluded after their years of friendship, was like trying to bottle up air; though he knew he had gotten something, he wasn’t sure exactly what he had gotten or even if he got it right.

His words took form into blocks of texts, that he wished would’ve left his head, but even as he sent them to Marui’s line, it lingered on on the back of his mind like a ghost.

“He isn’t replying,” he said quietly, feeling the weight of the attention the others had directed towards him. He could feel it one by one: Akaya who fidgeted uneasily in his seat and the faint anger that imbued itself into his tone, Jackal who had given up hope and seemed to have expected that Marui wouldn’t reply (not even to him). But most of all, he could feel the indiscernible eyes of Yukimura; the longer he stared at him, the harder he glared at his phone screen –– wishing for Marui to reply to him already, Marui who had clearly read his messages and chose deliberately to ignore him.

Yet again, another thing that was frowned upon by Sanada. 

He was brazen. Shameless. Impudent. He could go on and on, but what’s the point, this late in the game? He should’ve nipped a bad seed at its root, before it started becoming a problem. Marui wasn’t inconsiderate in middle school; not like this, not like now.

“He isn’t replying,” repeating himself again, yet his voice took a different tone, and he paid no heed to the cry of frustration that Akaya let out, nor the feeling of Yukimura’s hand slipping off from his knee.

Marui Bunta was a man as stubborn as he was, so Sanada knew that he was not going to reply at all, at least not today.

When he tried again the next morning, this time, to leave a call, Marui had changed his number.


	3. Yagyuu Hiroshi

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The disappearance of Marui Bunta through the eyes of the other members.

Yagyuu was the only one in that table who didn’t care about Marui’s disappearance. Was it that much of a surprise for the others, that someone with Marui’s qualifications decided to leave their hometown for Tokyo in pursuit of better work opportunities? He rather thought it was normal, he rather thought it was expected of him, of them –– why had they even bothered to come back to Yokohama in the first place? 

When Niou and Marui had come back, Yagyuu remembered the very distinct feeling of dismay. It was an unpleasant little thing. He rarely ever felt that in his life, everything in his life had always gone as he planned, more or less. Now that he had, he could say that he’s not very fond of it. Like an itch you couldn’t quite scratch, like a dull pain you couldn’t quite decipher.

_ What a letdown.  _

He couldn’t comprehend why Marui chose to come back. He  _ knew  _ why, but understanding it was a different matter altogether. There was a point in time where he thought the two of them were similar. They were selfish, egotistic, they looked at the world with blinders on, so that they may only see what’s ahead of them. 

That’s why they got along.

Either way, it was a trivial thing. He never cared much for Marui, in the end.  _ Unacceptable _ , Sanada had called Marui’s behaviour, and Yagyuu could only swallow back a derisive laughter. Bit back on his lower lip behind his glass for he knew how sharp the sound of his deep chuckles would sound cutting the tension in the air at that empty family restaurant.

Unacceptable, he had called it. But what’s really unacceptable was the visibly shaken Akaya, anger deeply permeating his colors. What’s really unacceptable was the laughable Jackal, who was he trying to fool? The third-rate act he was putting as a victim made Yagyuu want to hurl. He almost thought he enjoyed all the attention.

And then, there was Sanada. What grown adult would be this deeply affected by superficial, shallow things like ‘friendship’. Why was he so riled up about this? Were they transported back to their youth without Yagyuu’s knowing? It didn’t take someone as perceptive as Yukimura to know that it was his own insecurities imputed to this situation.

How laughable.

How pitiful.

How pathetic.

The words sank into a deep darkness inside him, a darkness that slowly spread out around him. The more he sat with these people, the more he felt cut off from them, the more distorted their voices became. As if he was the only one who no longer belonged there, as if around him was a black membrane that separated him from the rest of his former team members. Watching from the outside, that was always his place.

It didn’t bother him, however. It never bothered him. It was just how it’s supposed to be.

If he were to be honest (when had he ever been honest with these people, he couldn’t even remember the last time he’s done it –– if ever at all), he was rather glad that Bunta had up and left him like this.

Without a goodbye or even a word. The standard was set so low, he could just walk out of this place right this second and never look back, and Bunta would still be  _ worse _ than him. They would think he’d done this as a chain reaction to Bunta’s action, and thus blaming him for that. He didn’t even need to lie. Akaya would. Jackal perhaps. Sanada too. 

The simpleminded ones.

How long had they been playing this charade already? Hadn’t it gone on for too long? When they all came back and reunited after college, he had done so only to keep playing the role, a role he should’ve long retired. It was the same mask that he had worn since his middle school days, but he had grown up, and it was beginning to suffocate him. 

How long do they have to be stuck playing the same roles over and over again, stuck saying the same shit time and again, even after their mouths had bubbled up, they still wouldn’t be satisfied. It’s high time the school play ended. They were twenty seven years old already this year. Almost thirty and everyone’s still acting like bright-eyed schoolboys.

_ He was never bright-eyed, even as a schoolboy. _

If Marui hadn’t gone and disappeared, he reckoned it would be him who’d break the illusion the others were so desperately trying to keep together, glued together with cheap nostalgias of the good old days, the blazing days of youth. How tacky.  _ Grow up, already _ , he wanted to sneer at them, but he swallowed it down, knowing they would not listen.

When had they ever listened? Yukimura at the very least understood where he was coming from, but for reasons Yagyuu couldn’t fathom, was as eager as the others in keeping this ostentatious farce.

“Your anger will not make it more likely for him to pick up the phone. Surely, you know this, Sanada?”

His voice was cold and he felt someone’s eyes turn to look at him. Yanagi. He didn’t bother to meet their gaze. Should he had something to say, he would have spoken up. But as always, Yanagi remained silent. 

Yagyuu never liked that sly side of him, but he didn’t hate it either. 

The black coffee he ordered a while back had already been finished, leaving a dark ring around the inside of the mug. Starting with Marui, one by one they would start to leave the nest, leaving exactly the same spot in this pretend-family as his coffee. Yagyuu idly wondered who would be left in the empty nest, barely scraping by, fueled only by old memories.

Certainly, it would not be him, for Yagyuu’s apartment was emptied out by the next week.

Now, the head of the Tokyo hospital that had offered him a job after he finished his internship; what was his number again? His fingers scrolled through his contact and as he took off the mask he’d been forced to wear for so long, he put on a new one as the other voice on the voice greeted him.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had such a hard time with Yagyuu...Getting into Yagyuu's head...trying to figure out how he would sound...This is the best I could do. I feel like I've defeated the last floor boss lmao. I'd like to write more Yagyuu in the future.
> 
> Next chapter is Niou!


	4. Niou Masaharu

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The disappearance of Marui Bunta through the eyes of the other members.

Marui Bunta was not a nice person; he was not the geniable, affable persona he always presented himself as. Of course, Niou never meant that the other was faking, he just meant there was another side of Bunta that nobody even bothered to look at, to look for. Whereas Niou just saw Bunta as who he wholly was. It never bothered him, this other side of him where the light didn’t quite seep through the cracks and the smiles didn’t quite reach his eyes. It reminded him of something intimately close to him.

Perhaps Niou was the only one who understood Bunta the most amongst all of them. They were similar, in a way, after all.

In all of their years together, Niou always thought that Bunta felt very cold inside. How his eyes would look at him sometimes, and a slither of chill crept up on those warm autumn eyes. He had applauded how his former classmate wrapped his cold heart with the warmth of summer and how he let others be melted away with his smile, so much so that they never bothered to look right into the sun to find the frost of winters lurking underneath.

Marui Bunta was cruel because he exuded warmth and led you to a false sense of security, made you shed all your layers off as you bare yourself naked to him. He made it easy for people to think that he’s their best friend, he made it easy for people to open up to him, and he made them lap crumbles and scraps of who he was from the table, never fully giving anything in return.

That’s why he always gave a leer whenever Kirihara talked _this_ and **that** about Bunta with such affection; his eyes would sparkle and his voice would lit up. He almost pitied Akaya, almost wanted to tell him the truth about his adored senior, but Niou was kind, unlike some others in this little group, so he said nothing and smiled.

That’s why when Bunta left, he wasn’t all that surprised. He knew his friend was this kind of person, after all. That’s why they got along so well, that’s why he got along well with Yagyuu, that’s why they got together that one time, that’s why it all ended before anyone had ever the chance to find out.

As his eyes slither across the table, he saw the panic that started to creep into Sanada’s eyes and the hurt in Akaya’s. He couldn’t see Jackal’s eyes; he didn’t want to. Would he see a reflection of himself in Jackal staring back at him if he did? Something inside him felt cold and lonely and _hurt_ , just as Jackal did. But he was always better at concealing his emotions. He was always good at playing a role that others’ demanded of him. 

That’s why Yagyuu and him worked so well together. Who else would put up with him? Who else would love him like Niou did? The answer was no one. No one would’ve loved a wretched kid like Yagyuu once he took off that gentlemanly facade of his. Only him, and he wasn’t even sure why he fell for Yagyuu in the first place.

Niou didn’t want to look at Jackal, for he knew that they were in the same boat, they were the exact same pieces of pawn in this cruel game of love, and that he would end up in the exact place Jackal was had he been stupid enough to let emotions rule over his minds. 

See, Jackal played this game with no tact at all. He was crude in how honest he was. His passion was overflowing; and so intense it was that it scalded all that touched him. It was no wonder Bunta left him. He’s not a saint, he’s not even a remotely nice person. He wouldn’t let himself get burned by love. After all, no matter how much he loved Jackal, wasn’t he always the kind of person who loved himself more?

Kuwahara Jackal was playing this game like it’s rummy but everyone else is playing poker. Of course the poor bastard was destined to lose from the beginning. Ever since he picked up his first card.

Love did run out you know. Every relationship had its expiry date and Jackal’s relentless and straightforward ways were just way too abrasive that it hastened the process. A premature death. Perhaps if he had been patient enough, if he had been thoughtful enough, if he had been more willing in giving more and more pieces of himself until there’s nothing left.

Perhaps if he had been Niou enough.

The constant smile on his face ebbed away the moment the thought entered his head. it was frozen awkwardly in place, like a kid forcing himself to smile. 

Niou didn’t speak at all after Sanada and Akaya’s little outbursts, and he went home with Yagyuu; Yagyuu whose smile as they left the restaurant bothered him. 

It had been a week since the group met up. The heavy atmosphere from before still clung desperately into his back, like pale hands of a ghost softly caressing his skin. Niou suspected it was the same for everyone else –– it was not that he was sentimental towards Bunta or shared an especially close relationship with him. It was just the aftermath of his leaving and the reaction it evoked out of each one of the members. 

Like a slap back to reality.

Walking through a crowded street after meeting with a client, he noticed Bunta’s red mop of hair disappearing into a crowd. There was no mistaking it. He had stared into that very peculiar shade of red for all his second year in middle school in class and later in university. Niou could recognize him in his sleep, with his eyes closed. He knew how he walked, the slight way Bunta put a pressure on his right leg, the light shuffling sound it made as he pushed his right foot off the ground.

How many years had he spent studying Bunta? He could imitate him and lived his life as the other if he damn well wished.

_Snap_ , his phone camera took a picture of the retreating back as it disappeared into the ocean of strangers, just like Bunta would be in just a couple of years. He supposed he could look into his whereabouts, he supposed he could tell Yanagi about it.

“Puri~”

Of course Niou let him go, he didn’t pursue him. What’s the point of it? Bunta would simply vanish into thin air again. You couldn’t find a man who wanted to disappear.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's my birthday today and what better way to celebrate than releasing another chapter ♥ Niou is probably one of my favorites in Birth And Fester Verse. He intertwines right between everyone –– Jackal, Bunta, Yagyuu, Yukimura, all of whom will be essential characters in this verse. I hope you'll be looking forward for more Niou, which will be written by [freiline](https://archiveofourown.org/users/freiline) and I hope you enjoy this chapter!


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